Search

My Baby Didn't Get Eaten Today

No thanks to me! This post is for all the moms out there who feel like they're not Mom Enough or whatever Time magazine thinks will guilt-trip you into buying their latest issue. If your child has survived infancy without getting eaten, I salute you. I'm having a hard time with it this month.

Nux Gallica is almost 16 months old now, and she is growing ever more delectable each day. It's starting to frighten me. Let me explain.

It all started a couple weeks ago, when my local Barnes and Noble advertised a Fancy Nancy Tea Party for little girls and moms. I grabbed a flyer and wrote it down in my calendar, because I often take Nux out to brunch at Barnes and Noble anyway (it's close enough to walk on a pleasant morning), and I am constantly on the lookout for activities that will exhaust the child before naptime. Especially free ones.

So I dressed my baby up like a delicious cupcake and strolled her right into Cinderella's laser-whitened maw.

At first, Nux had a ball. She nibbled on a sugar cookie and oohed and aahed at all the little princesses and fairies arriving in their glitteriest, ruflliest, pinkest finery. She flounced her own gown and said "hi" to everyone and gently stroked the older girls' ribbons and bows. We sat on a bench for Fancy Nancy storytime. And through it all, the other children around us appeared sluggish, unresponsive, and glum beneath their shimmering tiaras. They reminded me of sad little clowns, or Paris Hilton's poor dogs.

OH NO, I thought. Cinderella has eaten these daughters already! Luckily, Nux caught on. After the first story and a half-dozen kicked-puppy pouts in exchange for her enthusiastic "hi" greetings, she turned to me and stated loudly, "All done!" I lifted her from the bench, and she flounced merrily to the choo choo train set on the other side of the children's area. FIRST CHILD CONSUMPTION THREAT AVERTED.

In the second incident, I ALMOST ATE MY OWN BABY. We had this lovely box of Godiva chocolates on the counter for Mother's Day, and my intrepid daughter pushed a chair up the counter, climbed up, opened the box, and took one out. I thought this was adorably clever for a child her age, but I didn't want her to shove a whole gooey and choke-hazardous caramel in her face, so I ran up to her and opened my mouth. She loves to feed people, so she put the chocolate in my mouth. In one of those terrible split-second decisions, I reasoned that she should at least get a taste of the chocolate as a reward for feeding Mama, so I started to bite off a piece. Almost at the exact moment the thought popped into my head, "I didn't think there was a nut in this chocolate!" my eyes met my daughter's in a mutual expression of horror. As you could have guessed, it wasn't a nut but a tender little Nux finger clenched between my teeth.

A complete maternal freakout ensued, with hugs and kisses and frantic apologies and a frozen lima bean compress. To be fair, I didn't bite hard enough to do any significant damage. There were just little tooth marks in her skin like she leaves on various parts of my body all the time (see how YOU like it, kid!), but I was absolutely traumatized. For the rest of the day, I couldn't eat anything without feeling a tiny little finger in my mouth and the words NOM NOM BABIES floating through my head. I fear that from now on, Godiva is going to taste like infanticide to me.

Later that day, the Daddy Man took our precious progeny on a bike ride to the zoo, where she had the time of her life meowing at tigers, knocking on a tortoise shell, and barking at donkeys. (Why not?) Daddy Man brought back to me a chilling photo of the snow leopard staring at my chubby, buttery little baby with ravenous murder in its eyes. He said that other children were making a ruckus on the other side of the enclosure trying to get the leopard's attention, but it was firmly locked onto my little Nux.

SHE IS SO DELICIOUS! And now I am completely paranoid. But my baby didn't get eaten today. Hooray!

So... has anyone else ever accidentally tried to eat their baby? Got any other entertaining stories of child endangerment to make me feel better?

Oh my! I can't imagine many people will say yes to your question of whether they tried to eat their baby, but I do remember when my now-teen daughter was a premie newborn. We had to wake her up every two hours to feed her. It was my shift, and at one point my wife asked me what I was doing. I had my daughter cradled in my arm, feeding her the bottle, only it wasn't my daughter; it was my pillow.

Ah, the sleep deprivation! I remember those nights of hallucinating that the baby was in bed with me when she wasn't. I woke my husband up in a panic a few times because I didn't remember putting her back in the cradle and couldn't find her in our bed... but she was always safely snoozing in her cradle right next to me.

Because of the big gap between the people fence and the leopard cage, he couldn't get them both in the frame. He just showed me a picture of the leopard with its face against the cage and told me what it was looking at. NOM NOM BABY!

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The prime of life starts at 35! It's the best-kept secret from younger people, but your 35th birthday is a major cause for celebration. For mine, I have made my own listicle of 35 reasons why experts agree that 35 is the best age to be:You get to say, "I'm 35." The number 35 carries so much more gravitas than 30, but you're only a few years older. At 34, I've started fudging my age--by adding a year. People automatically take me seriously, and if they don't, at least they tell me I look young for my age. (Eye roll, hair toss, "whatever.") 35-year-olds DGAF. Inner chill reaches new heights at 35. Despite its #2 status on this list, it's the #1 response I hear about what's best about hitting 35. My gorgeous friend Nerlie was beautiful and resilient and wise
beyond her years in high school, but now, at age 35, she gets to fully enjoy being herself on her own terms. She writes, "I've survived so much that I don't waste time o…

November 2018 Update: Sophia is settled in with Gavin a young soccer player (like mother like daughter) now, I guess, and Till is spending time with 36-year-old (hell yeah, thank you, sir) Ukrainian singer Svetlana Loboda. He is either her latest babydaddy or doing her the favor of bearding as such (not that he's great with beards, but we don't mind--we know how much he loves pregnant and lactating ladies) to help her keep some distance from her crazy ex who cuts his wrists over her. The juice continues...

To misquote Gaga, "I don't speak German, but I can look at foreign tabloids and guess what's going on if you like."

I guess it would be more professional and ladylike for me to be above this sordid celebrity gossip, but I'm not. I'm so not.

***IMPORTANT UPDATE, 2018***: Richard has immortalized his lifelong bromance with Till in a tender duet about their friendship, "Let's Go" by Richard's side band Emigrate. Till sings words such as "Zwei Herzen in mir schlagen" with sincerity and I think I am now deceased.

He's gregarious, well-spoken in both German and English, a professional showman, and an enthusiastic promoter for the band. In German, his name is pronounced "REE-kard," and in Germanglish, "Reeshard," or "Reesh" for short. Richard is sexy, and he knows it. To many Rammstein fans, he is the cuuuuuuute one. His Facebook page would have you believe it.

Legend has it that Richard has a lovechild with lead singer Till Lindeman. The myth is based in complicated facts and figures, including one unconventional love triangle. Circa 1990, Richard and Till …